Huge file size from DeepSkyStacker

[JemTaylor]

Hi....I'm trying to use DSS for the first time. I took just three CR2 images taken from my Canon 80D APSC camera and took all the defaults for DSS as suggested. It churned away and the 16bit TIFF image I got from 'save as...' was over  1 Gb in size. I tried using JPG frames instead and got an even bigger file.

Unfortunately my old Paint Shop Pro 7 couldn't open a file this big. Downloading Corel Paintshop Pro latest version managed to open it but really creaked with such a large file. It takes over a minute to adjust the brightness! Now my pc is not fantastic in terms of performance, but it's generally ok - Intel i5, 2.7Ghz, 16Gb RAM.

Is there a way to reduce the file size DSS outputs? Why is this file so huge?

thanks for any advice!

[Seelive]

The 16 bit TIFF from a 24Mpixel camera should be about 140Mbyte. Have you enabled the Drizzle option when stacking?

[JemTaylor]

I don't know! I will check....

Do I want it 'on' or 'off'???

[DaveS]

You want Drizzle OFF! Otherwise it will at least quadruple your file size.

[DaveS]

Could DSS have output a 32 bit TIFF?

[Seelive]

2 hours ago, DaveS said:

Could DSS have output a 32 bit TIFF?

A 32 bit file would only be twice as big so only about 280Mbyte.

@JemTaylor When you load the TIFF image into your processing software, what is the image size in pixels that the software reports?  For a 24Mbit camera it should be about 6000 x 4000 pixels.

[JemTaylor]

I have tried with drizzle off now and the file size is much more manageable! Around 140Mb

My old Paint Shop Pro 7 can handle that easily.

Thanks for the advice!

[Seelive]

1 hour ago, JemTaylor said:

I have tried with drizzle off now and the file size is much more manageable! Around 140Mb

My old Paint Shop Pro 7 can handle that easily.

Thanks for the advice!

I bet the DSS processing was also significantly quicker as well! You only get any advantage from using drizzle if your images are undersampled, there is movement between the images (dithering) and there are lots of images.